Asian stocks fell this week, with the regional benchmark gauge declining the most since August amid concern that improving US economic data will spur the US Federal Reserve to pare its stimulus program as soon as this month.
Toyota Motor Corp, a Japanese carmaker that gets 31 percent of its revenue in North America, sank 2.5 percent, as Qantas Airways Ltd slumped 16 percent after Australia’s largest carrier said it will post a record first-half loss and Standard & Poor’s cut its credit rating to “junk.” In Hong Kong, Standard Chartered PLC dropped 7.7 percent after the lender said full-year operating profit from consumer banking will decline at least 10 percent, hurt by its South Korean business.
The MSCI Asia Pacific Index retreated 1.8 percent this week to 139.47, the most since the week ended on Aug. 23. More than US$7 trillion has been added to the value of global equities this year — the most since 2009 — as central banks took steps to shore up economies.
However, the regional index has gained 7.8 percent this year amid the central banks’ stimulus and China’s economy showing signs of stabilizing. The gauge this week touched 14 times estimated earnings to reach the highest level since May, compared with multiples of 16.2 for the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index and 14.9 for the STOXX Europe 600 Index on Friday, data compiled by Bloomberg show.
In Taipei, the TAIEX fell 0.5 percent this week, after edging down 7.82 points to 8,367.72 on Friday, compared with 8,406.83 on Nov. 29.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (台積電) fell 0.96 percent to NT$103 on Friday, while smartphone maker HTC Corp (宏達電) rose 0.34 percent to NT$147.5.
Elsewhere in the region, Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 Index declined 2.5 percent to post its biggest weekly slide since June, while the KOSPI lost 3.2 percent, Singapore’s Straits Times Index dropped 2 percent and New Zealand’s NZX 50 Index sank 1.7 percent.
In Japan, the TOPIX fell 1.8 percent. This year, Bank of Japan Governor Haruhiko Kuroda helped drive a 44 percent surge in the TOPIX by maintaining monetary easing as he and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe sought to jolt the nation out of 15 years of deflation. The index is the best-performing of 24 developed markets tracked by Bloomberg.
Companies that do business in the US fell. Toyota slid 2.5 percent to ￥6,220, while Nissan Motor Co declined 4.2 percent to ￥897.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index slid 0.6 percent and China’s Shanghai Composite rose 0.8 percent.
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) said the environment for economic and social development next year is not optimistic, in a signal that leaders may be willing to accept slower growth next year.
“While the overall situation is good, the environment for economic and social development next year is not optimistic,” Xinhua news agency said, paraphrasing Xi’s remarks.
He said reform should be integrated into all sectors.
Fed policymakers are to meet on Dec. 17 and Dec. 18 after minutes of their last meeting in October showed it may reduce its bond buying should the US economy improve.
The share of economists predicting that the Fed will taper bond purchases this month doubled after a US government report on Friday showed back-to-back monthly payroll gains of 200,000 or more for the first time in almost a year.
The Federal Open Market Committee will probably begin reducing the US$85 billion in monthly bond-buying at the meeting next week, according to 34 percent of economists surveyed on Friday by Bloomberg, an increase from the 17 percent recorded in a Nov. 8 survey.
The US in the last quarter posted the fastest annualized growth since the start of last year and jobless claims unexpectedly fell, reports showed this week.
Bill Gross, manager of Pacific Investment Management Co’s, the world’s biggest bond fund, said the unprecedented cash added to the financial system by central banks worldwide is raising the risk of a slide in global asset prices.
“Investors are all playing the same dangerous game that depends on a near-perpetual policy of cheap financing and artificially low interest rates in a desperate gamble to promote growth,” Gross wrote in his monthly investment outlook posted on California-based Pimco LLC’s Web site.
In other markets on Friday:
Manila slipped 0.27 percent, or 16.01 points, from Thursday to close at 6,014.94.
Mumbai rose 0.18 percent, or 38.72 points, to finish at 20,996.53.
Wellington eased 0.14 percent, or 6.43 points, to end on 4,713.52.
FALLING BEHIND: Samsung shares have declined more than 20 percent this year, as the world’s largest chipmaker struggles in key markets and plays catch-up to rival SK Hynix Samsung Electronics Co is laying off workers in Southeast Asia, Australia and New Zealand as part of a plan to reduce its global headcount by thousands of jobs, sources familiar with the situation said. The layoffs could affect about 10 percent of its workforces in those markets, although the numbers for each subsidiary might vary, said one of the sources, who asked not to be named because the matter is private. Job cuts are planned for other overseas subsidiaries and could reach 10 percent in certain markets, the source said. The South Korean company has about 147,000 in staff overseas, more than half
TECH PARTNERSHIP: The deal with Arizona-based Amkor would provide TSMC with advanced packing and test capacities, a requirement to serve US customers Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) is collaborating with Amkor Technology Inc to provide local advanced packaging and test capacities in Arizona to address customer requirements for geographical flexibility in chip manufacturing. As part of the agreement, TSMC, the world’s biggest contract chipmaker, would contract turnkey advanced packaging and test services from Amkor at their planned facility in Peoria, Arizona, a joint statement released yesterday said. TSMC would leverage these services to support its customers, particularly those using TSMC’s advanced wafer fabrication facilities in Phoenix, Arizona, it said. The companies would jointly define the specific packaging technologies, such as TSMC’s Integrated
An Indian factory producing iPhone components resumed work yesterday after a fire that halted production — the third blaze to disrupt Apple Inc’s local supply chain since the start of last year. Local industrial behemoth Tata Group’s plant in Tamil Nadu, which was shut down by the unexplained fire on Saturday, is a key linchpin of Apple’s nascent supply chain in the country. A spokesperson for subsidiary Tata Electronics Pvt yesterday said that the company would restart work in “many areas of the facility today.” “We’ve been working diligently since Saturday to support our team and to identify the cause of the fire,”
Sales RecORD: Hon Hai’s consolidated sales rose by about 20 percent last quarter, while Largan, another Apple supplier, saw quarterly sales increase by 17 percent IPhone assembler Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) on Saturday reported its highest-ever quarterly sales for the third quarter on the back of solid global demand for artificial intelligence (AI) servers. Hon Hai, also known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團) globally, said it posted NT$1.85 trillion (US$57.93 billion) in consolidated sales in the July-to-September quarter, up 19.46 percent from the previous quarter and up 20.15 percent from a year earlier. The figure beat the previous third-quarter high of NT$1.74 trillion recorded in 2022, company data showed. Due to rising demand for AI, Hon Hai said its cloud and networking division enjoyed strong sales
RSS